


Velvet Gloves and Spit

by taotu



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Ambiguous/Open Ending, Anal Sex, Angst, Consent Issues, Explicit Consent, First Time, First War with Voldemort, Fuck Or Die, Implied/Referenced Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, M/M, Not Actually Unrequited Love, Pureblood Culture (Harry Potter), Sexual Content
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-10
Updated: 2020-09-10
Packaged: 2021-03-06 01:34:30
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 12,631
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25915198
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/taotu/pseuds/taotu
Summary: It's been a while since Sirius and Remus were last on good terms. James' grand scheme to mend their friendship sends them on an Order mission together, where at the hands of Death Eaters, they fall prey to a less-than-savoury, old pureblood curse.
Relationships: Sirius Black/Remus Lupin
Comments: 12
Kudos: 153
Collections: Wolfstar Hurt Fest





	Velvet Gloves and Spit

**Author's Note:**

> For prompt 26:  
>  **Prompt:** Fuck or die scenario! Maybe they get caught during a mission in the first war? Maybe it's some kind of curse? Still, Remus and Sirius have to have sex, or else one (or both) of them will die.  
>  **Requests/Comments:** Feel free to explore the dilemma, the "will this end our friendship?" angst and the consequences of it, if you'd like. Discussions of the consent issues that come with this scenario would be great, too.
> 
> Thank you x a billion as always to jennandblitz for the beta ♥︎ Title from the Timber Timbre song of the same name!

Lily Evans said, “I don’t exactly think this analogises to Potions class, James.”

But James Potter was invested. He had his hands on Albus Dumbledore’s desk, had slammed his palm down several a time to drive his point home. At Lily’s rebuff, his shoulders slackened, and he muttered, “Lily, _please_ ,” as he lifted his eyes again to Dumbledore’s. “I don’t know what other way there is to go about it, sir. It hasn’t been this bad since 1976.”

The year being 1979, Lily thought it just barely appropriate to refer to their sixth year at Hogwarts as _1976_.

“Marlene’s told me repeatedly she can’t stand going on missions with Sirius—he’s trigger-happy and reckless; Alice can’t handle Remus’ constant _brooding_ , and he hasn’t—hasn’t bloody showered or slept in weeks, and frankly, _I’m_ done dealing with them and their issues sucking up all the air in the room. There’s none left for the rest of us.”

“I think _this_ ,” said Lily, referring to the collective mission of the Order of the Phoenix, “is a bit bigger than your feelings, James.”

Dumbledore looked on silently from behind glinting glass crescent moons, fingers laced over the desk.

“You’re not listening!” rasped James, once again slapping the mahogany. Lily took pity on the headmaster’s desk. “ _This_ cannot happen if we’re all unfocused. And they’re—they’re malignant, is what they are. When was the last time we had a successful mission where no one got hurt because of something preventable? When was the last time we made it through an Order meeting without Sirius showing up late or being a complete dick and disrupting everything like a fucking one-man show?” Lily noted that James’ eyes grew scarlet, like the blood vessels in his eyes were bursting with his urgency. “Sure, we’re all stressed and we’re all dicks sometimes, but it’s because of—I _know_ it’s because of—whatever’s going on between them. They’re like dogs circling each other in a fighting ring. I don’t know what their problem is with each other, but us doing _nothing_ isn’t helping. Sir, please.” James’ voice died out in a croak.

Dumbledore was motionless, then breathed out once through his nose. He looked to Lily as a beacon of placidity. “What is this about… Potions class?”

Lily lifted her hand, felt the words form on her tongue, but James was abusing the desk again. He breathed, “Potions class—”

“James has this theory,” stated Lily, curling her hand around James’ elbow. Where her thumb pressed in, she could feel his pulse rocketing. James turned away from the desk, scrubbed his hands over his face, fingertips dragging under the lenses of his spectacles. “Remus and Sirius… they don’t fight often, at least… not to my recollection. But James claims—”

“It’s not a theory _or_ a claim,” he muttered.

“—he reckons they’ll work out their… ill will if you place them on a mission together. Alone.” With a fingertip, she grazed a nick in the desk’s edge. “It’s a juvenile theory, Professor,” she ignored James’ grumble of protest, he could very well complain about her word choice once they made it home, “but apparently, there was never an issue—at school, that is—that they weren’t able to resolve by… working as Potions partners.”

“I don’t just _reckon_ , Professor. There was second year, when we didn’t know about Remus’ condition and he injured himself terribly during a full moon, but wouldn’t tell us how. Sirius was furious with him, silent treatment and all, but I tricked Remus into switching spots in Potions, and they made up over the Sleeping Draught. It was Skele-Gro in fourth year, Wit-Sharpener in fifth, and… well, you might’ve guessed that Remus didn’t speak to Sirius for a month after his prank on Snape in sixth year. But Amortentia did it that time, it did.” James took a breath, and Lily saw it in the rise and fall of his chest. There was a smear of dried blood on his shoulder, staining the irksome orange of his shirt where he’d wiped a bloody nose from a close call with Bellatrix Black—newly _Lestrange_ —earlier that evening. They’d come to Hogwarts straight from the field. “Sir, I know it sounds silly—mad, even, but… Merlin.” He dug his nails into his scruffy jaw, shook his head. “They just need to bloody work together, is all.”

Dumbledore watched James with flat, blue eyes. Then he pushed his glasses up his nose and cleared his throat. “The Death Eaters have been using carrier ravens to relay their communications. Less obvious than owls, or so they thought. I’m sure they’ll find a new medium once they know we’ve caught up to them. But we’ve been tracking their movements, these ravens… I was going to send you with Gideon and Emmeline, James, to investigate a suspect farm near Applecross.”

Despite never having heard of an _Applecross_ , James said tersely, “Give it to them instead.”

Lily looked between the two men, a crease between her brows. “ _Two_ wizards? To investigate a probable Death Eater hotspot?” She eyed Dumbledore warily. “That’s a bit slim, Professor. I’d just send them on a dummy mission, should they have to go as just the two.”

“No need for an ambush. We’re just looking for a confirmation of activity in the area,” said Dumbledore, smiling.

“We can’t send them on a fake mission, Lily,” muttered James. “They’re not stupid. That’ll just make them angrier. And besides, the whole point is that they need to depend on one another. We can’t send them after a dead end. They wouldn’t even need an excuse to get away from each other.”

Lily’s lips pursed. She fought the urge to roll her eyes, as James would only argue that he knew them best. Still, she couldn’t help the sinking feeling of uncertainty.

“Very well,” said Dumbledore, “at tomorrow’s meeting, when I distribute mission assignments, I’ll give this to Remus and Sirius.”

James took a deep inhale and let it out. He laced his fingers together, pressed them to the middle of his forehead, and shut his eyes. “Thank you, sir.”

“Let’s hope you’re not wrong, Mr. Potter.”

* * *

The next night’s meeting was an undeniably unpleasant affair.

It was held at the Longbottom household. A small household it was, with scarcely enough room for all the Order members to squeeze in. Lily was shocked they hadn’t found a need to overflow into the cramped toilet yet. Before the meeting had even begun, they received a noise complaint from the elderly downstairs neighbours. Alastor Moody had whisked the drapes shut before charming the parquet floor rubbery-soft under everyone’s feet.

Briefly, before assignments, Dumbledore held court in the living room and informed them of the latest news. Then he receded into the Longbottoms’ bedroom, to which he would call in sections of the group, one by one. When Gideon and Fabian Prewett were called together, they high-fived victoriously. Lily frowned where she leaned by the mantle. She still didn’t think it right—nor logical—to send loved ones on missions together, but Dumbledore saw it fit to capitalise on the members’ strengths. Together, the Prewett twins were undeniably powerful.

Remus sat on the floor beside Lily’s feet. His hair tickled her leg as he threatened to nod off during assignment distribution, lulled by the quiet conversation in pockets around the room. His eyes were circled in deep purple, neck speckled with un-werewolf-like bites and scratches. From human mouths and nails, thought Lily. She brushed her fingers into his hair. Half-asleep, Remus was oblivious as the room slowly emptied out. By the bedroom door, though, Sirius paced to and fro in the four square-foot unoccupied tract in front of James. The longer he went without his name called, the more agitated he grew and the more resentful looks he shot in Lily’s direction. Or Remus’, she supposed. She’d hugged Sirius on his way in, fought a grimace at the reek of single malt as he’d kissed her forehead. She could only be grateful, though, that he’d not caused a drunken disturbance during that night’s Order-wide announcements.

Lily took Peter’s hand when she was summoned into the dark bedroom with both him and Emmeline. Inside, Dumbledore sat at a small writing desk, waiting. When she reemerged, she locked eyes with James, and silently, they vowed to stay put as Dumbledore came to the bedroom doorway and said, “Lupin and Black.”

Lily roused Remus, who had to open his eyes to the smirkingly rueful look aimed his way by Sirius. “What,” he mumbled, but she knew he’d heard, and his body seemed to creak as he got to his feet. He shuffled toward the bedroom, following Sirius—Sirius, who was amid a bitter bout of laughter, barking, “You’re pulling a joke on me, Albus, you must be.”

After Dumbledore’s rundown, Sirius Disapparated straight from the bedroom with an egregious whip-crack sound that reverberated through the bones of the building. Lily and James were present to watch Remus schlep out alone, but they all had to promptly depart, as the downstairs neighbours had phoned the police and there were red and blue lights flashing through the cracks in the curtains onto Remus’ wan cheek.

* * *

Eighteen minutes to nine at night, Sirius waited at the coordinates of the designated meeting spot, a kilometre’s walk from the apparition point. The air was heavy and humid from daytime rain, almost enough to condensate on Sirius’ upper lip, and it made the strands of hair framing his face curl unbecomingly. He itched to light a cigarette, but was paranoid even about its faint glow, so he swigged from the flask in his jacket pocket.

Remus was late. Sirius ventured to guess he might not be coming at all, but then a nearby rustle of brush had him whipping out his wand, pointing it into the weary face of Remus Lupin. To be fair, Remus’ wand was drawn, too, and pointed at Sirius’ heart. How apt.

“I was beginning to think you wouldn’t show,” muttered Sirius, arm unmoving. “You’re late.”

“I was only operating on your schedule,” said Remus, features slackened. His sigh was warm into the warmer air. “I figured that... ten minutes late, maybe a forty percent chance you’d be here. Twenty minutes, slightly higher. Of course, there’s always the non-negligible chance you wouldn’t come at all.” Remus’ wand dug into his sternum, and his eyes narrowed. “Have you been drinking?”

Sirius’ upper lip twitched. “Such a lovely greeting, Moony,” he drawled, smiling humourlessly, “I feel I needn’t even verify your identity.”

Remus rolled his eyes toward the half moon. “For posterity—”

“Yes, yes, just a joke, I know how you like to play by the rules.”

Remus looked at him, stoic. “After working on what potion in class did I _finally”_ —he emphasised the word with a flair that told Sirius he was being mocked—“forgive you for setting me up to murder Severus Snape?”

Sirius wasn’t really in the mood to get into all the things wrong with that question. And the answer stung him, so he had to get it off his tongue. “Amortentia,” he muttered stiffly. He remembered how pitiful and sulky he’d been that Potions class, how he’d been that way for weeks, and how the pungency of the Amortentia had given his stupid, sad younger self a stiffy. It hadn’t helped that the scent oscillated between cigarette smoke and rain-damp soil and Remus’ thick knitted jumpers, stuffy from sitting at the bottom of his trunk awaiting colder months. Sirius didn’t drop his wand, only dug it gently into Remus’ cheek, down by the hard angle of his jaw. “Why—couldn’t you just ask what you gave me for Christmas in fifth year, or something? Why did you have to go with that?”

Remus lowered his wand, seemingly at ease, but moved no closer and no further so Sirius’ wand still grazed his face. He shrugged. “First thing that came to mind.” His eyes were steady but tired, and he wore a dark, plaid scarf around his neck, though Sirius knew the smattering of bruises must’ve gone yellow, perhaps were accompanied by new ones. “Your turn.”

“What?” Sirius scoffed. “By now, I’m quite sure it’s you.” No one else pissed him off with such little effort. But when Remus’ impertinence didn’t flag and he only let Sirius’ wand sink deeper into the hollow of his cheek, Sirius sighed, jaw clenched. “Where were you last night?”

Remus hesitated, then laughed, hoarse. “You don’t even know the answer to that, Sirius.”

“But I’d like to. Or maybe you could just enlighten me as to whether she was a muggle or witch whose bed you slept in.”

Remus palmed Sirius’ wand, pressing it down and away. Sirius let him. It was a stupid question anyhow, so he evaded Remus’ eyes. He followed, though, as Remus stepped onto the dirt road and pointed ahead with his wand. “It’s roughly two hundred yards past that hill, then a right onto the moor and three hundred off-road,” said Remus, reciting Dumbledore’s owled brief like a good little pupil.

“We can just walk the diagonal,” said Sirius, waving idly at the dark, mushy moors to their right.

“But you can’t possibly know the exact angle—”

“It’s a farm and it’s _that_ _way_. We don’t have to measure the bloody angle.” Sirius wasn’t keen on starting a fight so near to a Death Eater hideaway. He was drunk but not _that_ drunk, could still feel when Remus was tempting him to yell. For once, he didn’t. “We’ll find it, Remus, it’s not that important.” He un-pocketed his flask and marched onto the grass, boots squelching, and as he took another swallow off his flask, he heard Remus begrudgingly comply.

They trudged in silence for two minutes. _In silence_. Sirius suppressed genuine shock that they had yet to delve into the frustrating ordeal of being partnered, but perhaps they had reached the _acceptance_ phase of their quarrel. Though it hadn’t ever really felt like acceptance, Sirius thought, from his nightly vantage point alone in their living room whilst Remus’ unoccupied bedroom gathered dust. He wasn’t ready to accept anything. He couldn’t even pinpoint the inception of the “quarrel.”

Remus said, “You reckon they’ve set any traps?”

“Like landmines? Booby-traps?” Remus didn’t laugh. Sirius wasn’t sure what he was expecting. “Er… probably just guards, if anything.”

“Right.”

Sirius came to a stop and extended his arm to signal to Remus. They stood at the top of a hill, and down its gentle slope, nestled into the valley, was a farm that had seen better days. Sirius saw this even in the dark; the fence was falling apart, the squat house rotten and crumbling. The doors of the barn, gray and imposing, were faintly aglow from within.

“The barn,” whispered Remus.

“Get down,” hissed Sirius, grabbing hold of Remus’ arm as he stumbled less-than-elegantly to the grass. It soaked the fronts of their clothes, which had Sirius cringing.

Remus shook Sirius’ grip from his wrist, lifted his head to peer through the shrubbery as a black-cloaked figure came sweeping around the corner of the barn. Sirius followed his gaze. The figure’s face was pale in the moonlight, and it circled the barn’s outer perimeter with a dutiful sense of purpose. “That’s what I pictured Regulus doing until he ran off,” Sirius murmured. “Marching in circles for hours, a disposable line of defence, while the bigger, badder people plotted inside.”

Remus didn’t like to speak of the dead, so he said nothing. Sirius knew this. He did it anyway.

“You think they’re just congregating?” Sirius went on. “Or that this stupid fuck’s guarding something else?”

Remus bit his lip. With too much indulgence, Sirius inspected his profile. “If they’re sending correspondence from here…” He eyed the barn awhile, pursed his lower lip in lieu of a shrug. “There could be any number of things behind those doors.”

“Like my next six kills,” Sirius said cheerily. Remus couldn’t take a joke.

“We’re only two,” reminded Remus as he rose onto his elbows. The ground squished, oozing wetness that seeped into his threadbare jacket. Sirius watched him shiver. “At the very most, we can stun whoever’s on guard, get an ID on them, maybe see if there’s a window on the other side we might look through, but we have no way of knowing how many are inside, or more importantly, _who_ is inside—”

Sirius was on his feet, trekking down the hill. He slipped on a muddy spot but regained his balance with a huff and a chuckle, sights set on a collapsed dip in the fence he could easily lope through. The guard was on the loop behind the barn, but as soon as Sirius reached the hill’s base and his feet touched flat ground, Remus shot a strange variation of _Incarcerous_ at him, one that twined ropes around his ankles that slithered away like snakes once Sirius had found himself face flat on the grass.

Grunting in pain, Sirius squinted as the grass around him shone a pale blue and grew before his eyes, blades curling toward the pitch-black sky. Remus joined him on the grass and snuffed out the glow. He grabbed Sirius by the scruff of his neck, but kept him low behind his makeshift camouflage. “You’re not that daft,” Remus fumed, spit flying into Sirius’ eyes. “You can’t just march in there and start a battle royale. First off, _we’re only two_ , second, there could be something valuable in there, and we don’t want it _destroyed_ —”

“We’re here, aren’t we?” Sirius argued as he tensed against the sting of Remus’ fingernails. “Just because Dumbledore would rather tiptoe, it doesn’t mean we should. You’re ace at dueling, and I’m about half as good, but together we’re still better than Voldemort’s riffraff and most of the Order. What’s the use in coming back _again_ with, like, fucking _Dearborn_ and—” Sirius knew Remus liked Dearborn, maybe even looked at him in an off-colour way during Order meetings if Sirius was correctly reading the room. Hell, Caradoc was more than competent, but Sirius was just in the mood to strike a nerve.

Remus leaned close, his wand pointed at Sirius’ throat, even if it only further muddied his coat sleeve. “I can’t even begin to discern whether you genuinely think yourself above Dumbledore’s orders, or if you’re in one of your batshit, attention-seeking—”

A flash of green light streaked across Sirius’ line of sight. Remus’ head thumped dully against the grass, eyes still half-open.

“Remus!” Sirius shrieked. He frantically scrambled to cover Remus with his body, thrashed his arm out to cast a blasting curse that, in his sheer panic, missed its mark by several feet and soared squarely between the dark silhouettes of Rodolphus and Rabastan Lestrange. They sneered downward at him with a matching set of ugly curls to their lips.

Wand pointed at the Lestranges, Sirius fumbled to check for Remus’ pulse behind his back. Whatever had knocked Remus out didn’t have the same acrid scent to it that an AK did, but he wasn’t a hopeful man. 

Rodolphus muttered, “Don’t kill him, Bastan, remember?” and they shared a vile smirk watching Sirius scramble.

Sirius had time to snarl _“Avada”_ before a spell shook his core and swallowed his vision into a stomach of blackness.

* * *

Sirius woke on what felt like cold concrete.

His head ached and it took him a moment of distraught confusion to recognise it was residual from being stunned, not a hangover. He had been on the receiving end of too many a _Stupefy_ to not place the feeling.

The ground beneath him may have been cold but the air was muggy and hardly breathable. He patted his boot in shock to discover his wand at home in its usual place. He doubted he’d placed it there while unconscious, but he also doubted the grace of the Lestrange brothers.

With a flick of his wrist, he cast a weak _Lumos_ and hovered his wand over the floor—gray and strewn with bits of hay. A nearby grunt had Sirius whipping around to shine the glow of his wand in Remus’ groggy face. Remus had propped himself on his elbows, brow in a furrow and eyes squinted as they adjusted to the whitish light of Sirius’ wand.

“Oh, thank god,” breathed Sirius. It only took the sight of Remus’ crinkled face to have all the frenzy from his last moments of consciousness pulsing back into his heart.

“What—” Remus began in a scratchy tone, presumably on his way to the word _happened_ , but he never completed the thought. He was otherwise distracted by his hand, which he’d lifted from the ground, only to find it inextricable from Sirius’. “What,” Remus breathed again, and Sirius had nothing to say as Remus scrambled for his own wand and cast a second _Lumos._ A tarnished, double-banded silver ring linked their little fingers together.

Sirius studied it. The ring. Thick, clearly old. When Remus pulled, the ring wouldn’t budge.

He’d seen it before, Sirius had. Or one like it, at the very least. He just didn’t want to confess it, not while Remus puzzled over it so.

Remus didn’t address the ring at first, but he did continue to stare at it. “What happened?” he muttered.

“Er.” Sirius scraped his teeth on his lower lip. “Rabastan and Rodolphus, they heard us… or saw us, I don’t know. They stunned you before you could notice them. Then me.” _They wanted me to see their faces, to know it was them._

Sirius didn’t expect Remus to ask the right question so soon.

“Why didn’t they just kill us?” Remus asked, voice wavering as if anticipating the worst kind of answer. Sirius wished Remus was less clever, less inquisitive, wished he’d just spend a moment being glad to still have the breath of life in his lungs. When Sirius said nothing, Remus raised his lit wand to Sirius’ eyes. Sirius had to shield his eyes with his wrist, so his own white light mingled with Remus’ gold. Placing the heavy emphasis of apprehension behind his every word, Remus said, “The Lestranges are not merciful, Sirius.”

Sirius looked at him, contrite. The smells around him told him they were inside the farm’s barn, and with a torque of his wand, he mumbled, “ _Lumos Maxima_ ,” and sent a ball of light toward the beamed ceiling of the gray wooden barn.

It brought the space around them into cold clarity. Remus muttered, “ _Nox_.” The barn was empty. Nothing hinted that the Death Eaters had been there—hours… hours earlier? Sirius didn’t know what time it was. There wasn’t a trace of evidence of their presence, not a shred of parchment or a thread off a robe left behind. Sirius pressed his fingertips into his eyelids. He felt a tug on his hand, only because Remus was examining the ring again.

“They could’ve killed us,” Remus said again. He shook his head, frown lines creasing his face. “It would’ve been so… _easy_.”

Sirius reached for the sleeve of Remus’ jacket, gave it a pinch. It was soggy still, they couldn’t have been out long.

Then he looked again at the ring. Moving his hand onto his knee meant dragging Remus’ hand along, too, and Sirius felt guilty for it, those few inches that Remus couldn’t help but move with him.

The thick bands were joined by a flat surface, from which dirty, silver flowers rose. Bloodbells. Small and delicate over Sirius’ knuckle, similarly over Remus’. They were a dark omen. If Sirius had a choice, he would’ve rather not known, lived in oblivion and died in this barn with Remus at dawn. But it was in his blood to know, quite literally, and the Lestranges knew that.

Remus took two breaths, in and out, that trembled in the standing air. “I’ve known you for eight years, Sirius. The fact that you’re not losing it right now says you know something I don’t.”

Again, Sirius wished he didn’t. He was tempted to snark something like _eight years, Moony, how should we celebrate our friend-versary?!_ but it wasn’t the time, there simply _wasn’t_ time. It was limited.

“It’s cursed,” muttered Sirius.

Remus’ eyes flashed up to him, then back down. “I could’ve guessed as much.” It was the most civil they’d acted in months. Sirius loathed that it had to be _this_ moment, of all the moments, that he felt secure again around Remus.

Then Sirius had to chuckle. Secure. _All I need is a minute to shatter it all_. In rubbing his knuckles across his mouth, he wiped the bitter smile away and said, “They’d rather torture us than kill us.” Remus went rigid—not visibly, but Sirius could feel the internal shift where the cursed ring connected them. “It’s… an old pureblood relic. Well, not _that_ old. Can’t even be sure it hasn’t been recently used, that the Lestranges haven’t left it nice and warm for us.” The thought made Sirius taste bile on the back of his tongue. He set his wand to the cold ground. Remus loosened his scarf, and Sirius deliberately didn’t look for the bruises.

“What do you mean?” Remus watched him openly.

“It’s for marriage consummation,” said Sirius through a sigh. “It’s… well. You know we’re a dying species, us purebloods. Sometimes mothers are too ill to bear babies, sometimes fathers are just sterile, half of us are stillborn or don’t make it to age three. But you’ve still got to try!” His voice cracked with put-on joviality. “Or so they think. Replenish the population, and all. If more of us are dying off than being born…” Sirius’ lips tightened. He piqued his brows. “So you start them young, fresh off the altar. Send the unhappy couple straight from the reception off to bed, ring their fingers and curse them to consummate the marriage that night or they’ll both be dead by dawn.” Sirius’ eyes must have crossed watching his _Lumos_ glint off the silver petals. His nostrils flared. “I imagine the cleanup process in the morning isn’t very pretty.”

Remus stayed silent. Sirius wouldn’t have expected anything else. Remus looked away into the barn’s dark corner, then back at Sirius. He cleared his throat. “So we’re cursed,” Remus said, stolid.

“We’re cursed.”

A smile tugged at the corners of Remus’ lips. It wasn’t a pretty smile. “I didn’t realise there were more reasons to hate blood purists.”

“You’d probably die before you could write them all down.”

“I don’t think I’ll have to wait that long.”

Sirius grimaced. He pulled his knee into his chest and laid his forehead to it.

“They really just kill them off, then?” murmured Remus. “These eighteen year-old kids?”

“Well. Sometimes the bride’s eighteen and the groom’s thirty-five, but yes. Bellatrix is the exception, though. I heard it was a struggle to find her a _suitable match_. That’s the excuse, at least, when you’re that insane and abhorrent.” Remus didn’t laugh, so Sirius filled the cricketing, quiet night with his voice. “Sounds like a harsh punishment, I know. Not every pureblood family practises it. There’s one in my family, though. A ring. And the thing is… I don’t even know if it’s unusually cruel for them. I don’t think my mother is particularly unconventional for a pureblood, and yet—can’t be of service to your new husband? You must not be demure enough, forget your healthy womb. _Kill her_ , she’d say. Can’t be the _very_ picture of masculinity and impregnate the wife you’ve known for approximately two tea parties under parental supervision, and on your very first try? You’ve failed your duty to extend the family line. _Kill him_.”

Bony fingers sank into Sirius’ shoulder and squeezed. “There’s nothing normal about your mum.”

Sirius tilted his head so his temple rested on his kneecap. If Remus had been watching him, he wasn’t anymore.

“That ideology doesn’t make any sense,” said Remus, quiet. “Like… what if the bride has vaginismus?”

Sirius blinked. “Has _what?”_

Remus shrugged. He picked apart a dry piece of hay by his foot. “Vaginismus. It’s like… when the vagina clenches up real tight against anything going in. Makes sex hurt a lot.”

Sirius arched an eyebrow— _why do you know this?_ —then wondered if he should’ve known it himself, despite his disinterest in the female reproductive system. “Ah, yes! You’re right! There _is_ a loophole in the curse for that. You’re doomed if you can’t consummate your marriage—unless you have vaginismus! Then it’s okay, you’re totally safe!” Sirius nattered brightly.

Remus gave him a blank look.

Sirius only stared right back. “I don’t know, Remus. I’d assume the line of thought of the _purebloods of old_ went a bit like: you have vaginismus? Well, fuck you.”

Remus held his impertinent gaze. Then the barn went dark as Sirius’ _Lumos Maxima_ maxed out. Sirius felt disembodied, mostly just from his pinkie finger.

A wave of heat swept past Sirius’ face, rustling the hair that hung by his eyes. Then a flame flared to life in an oil lantern in the barn’s darkest corner. Remus’ face was bathed in darkness, backlit, but Sirius could feel that the glow painted his own cheeks orange. Remus set his wand on the ground with a quiet _tap._

Well, thought Sirius, either we wait and see if we die quickly and painlessly, or the more realistic alternative of ruthless—

“I don’t want you to die yet, Sirius.”

Sirius’ throat constricted. He coughed, and with the predictable tendency to evade loaded conversation, said, “ _Yet_. Right. Would tomorrow work better for you?”

Remus swatted the back of his head. Sirius left his head to hang down between his shoulders, between the comfortable dark curtains of his hair. Remus said nothing, so Sirius sighed, dug his flask from his pocket and offered it to Remus. “This isn’t one of those _I love you, thank you_ moments, Moony. It should just be a given that I want you to live.” He lifted his head, flicked his chin to toss hair from his eyes. “Obviously.”

Remus shifted to face him, unceremoniously snatched the flask from Sirius. He appeared less than impressed when he gave it a shake and heard the slosh of mere dregs. Being Remus, he unscrewed the cap and drained the last of Sirius’ whisky. It was apparently enough to make Remus scrunch his nose, which he never did, even with the smokiest of whiskies.

“Let’s do it,” uttered Remus.

Sirius swore that for a second, he didn’t have a tongue with which to form words. “What?”

Remus seemed to mull something over. “Well, this could mean any number of things.” Remus always said that. _Any number of things_. “I’m Isabella Flint, from the year above us at school. Without a doubt she’s a pureblood. And… it’s the night of our big fat pureblood wedding.” Remus swallowed, shrugged one shoulder. Sirius’ head spun, and fast, because he’d forgotten Isabella Flint’s existence. He wasn’t sure he’d ever taken note. “Or, I don’t know, she might not do it for you anymore. I’m Rita Hayworth, and we’re in your wet—”

“I swear you just got wasted off one sip of whisky.” Sirius snapped his fingers. “Like _that_.”

“Shut up.” Remus bit skin off the side of his thumb, no longer looking at Sirius. “I just don’t want to sit here and wait for you to die.”

“Us.”

Defeatedly, Remus tossed the flask onto the floor. “I know.”

“We’ll both die.”

“I know.” Remus moved to press his fingers to his temples and jerked Sirius’ hand with him. He seemed surprised when it happened. Sirius would rub his temple for him if he only asked. “Sorry.”

Sirius smiled.

Remus said, “It’s fitting.”

“Hm?”

“Bloodbells.” Remus leaned over their hands and pointed at the flowers budding from the ring.

“Poisonous.”

“Mhm.” Remus smiled, ephemeral. “And?”

“And what?”

“You never did pay attention during Herbology.”

Years when Sirius was lucky, they had Herbology during the last slot of the school day. When the days got short and the nights long, the sun would begin to set while they were still in the greenhouse. The fading sunlight would fleck Remus’ hair and eyes with gold, as if revealing his true colours. Of course Sirius never paid attention. “Remember when I passed out from the Mandrake screams?”

“I was thinking more that time the Venomous Tentacula wouldn’t let you go. It wouldn’t even bite you, just kind of… cradled you.”

“I have that effect.” Sirius nodded absently. “On plants.” Sirius watched Remus try to suppress a smile. His heart had butterfly wings, many of them.

Remus grazed his forefinger over the silver petals on his knuckle. “Bloodbells are monoecious. They have male and female flowers on the same plant. The flower on my finger… see that bud, in the center of all the petals? That means it’s the female flower.” He moved his finger to point to the four, thin tubes protruding from the flower at Sirius’ knuckle. “These things are the stamen. Yours is the male flower.”

Sirius’ lips separated. “Oh.” He stared at the lantern until it became a permanent, iridescent splotch in his vision. “Are we—”

“Yes, goddammit,” whispered Remus. Any traces of nostalgia had dissipated from his face, replaced with anguish. “The way I see it, there’s no other choice. I couldn’t…” Remus bit through the skin off his finger again. “Unless you… but I just don’t think it’s worth it, even for that.”

Sirius had difficulty reading Remus’ eyes in the dark. “Unless I…?” His stomach lurched. “Oh. Oh, no. I’m… you think I’d rather die than have sex with you? You think I’d rather _you_ die?” It was beyond bizarre to say aloud. He laughed, a hideous, choked sound. “No, Remus. I’ve been a nuisance and a pest and your only least favourite flatmate and my liver’s only least favourite human vessel, but…” He shook his head, but couldn’t find the right words. So he just said, “Obviously.”

“Obviously,” echoed Remus skeptically. Then, “So you’re agreeing to it?”

Sirius shrugged. He had to act as if his heart wasn’t leaping out of his chest in dread, that _it_ had to happen like this. _Had_ to happen, literally. No longer would there be a Sirius or Remus if it didn’t. “Like you said, there’s no other choice.”

“No, Sirius, you have to agree.”

Sirius looked at him, puzzled.

“Please,” said Remus. “Not—not _please_ as in _please agree_ , you have to decide that for yourself, but _please_ as in—we’re cursed, we’ll die if we don’t, so please tell me you understand what we’re getting ourselves into. And that you know it’s okay to change your mind at any point.”

Jocularly, Sirius thought that if he’d wanted to change his mind, he would’ve done it ages ago. But he supposed this was different, with lives on the line and all. “Okay,” he said. “Yeah. Yes. I understand.”

Remus nodded and exhaled. “Me too.” He shoved his scarf to the side, rubbed a hand up and down the back of his neck. From the look on his face, he was going to say something Sirius wouldn’t want to hear. “At least we won’t have to worry about… souring things between us.”

Sirius supposed he hadn’t expected to walk out of this barn and return to normality. He saw himself alone, clinging to that small, sunshiney bit of banter about Herbology for months to come. “You make it sound as if you don’t want to go back to normal.”

“I _am_ normal. I haven’t changed, Sirius. You’ve just taken up this new habit of finding fault in everything I do.”

 _That’s a shitty way of saying I don’t approve of you sleeping in a different stranger’s bed every night during wartime when you’ve a perfectly good bed somewhere close to me, somewhere where I have even the slightest chance of protecting you._ Sirius’ countenance was grim. And _I’m jealous, you fucking bastard._ “Finding fault,” Sirius huffed, but didn’t comment. “Is that why you never come home?”

Remus said nothing, neither nodded nor shook his head. He bit more skin off his forefinger.

“Right,” said Sirius, infuriated, belligerent. “We should be ever so grateful to the Lestranges that they’ve chosen _now_ to curse me to fuck my best friend or die, because things are already so shitty between us. There’s zero cause to believe we could ever fix things, so we might as well fuck things up some more while we still can.”

Remus stood, and Sirius’ arm dangled in the air between them. “I just want to see what the sky looks like.” This translated to: _I want to see how long we have left_. Sirius got to his feet, scowling and stubborn, but let Remus tote him along like a dog on a leash. It was fittingly thematic.

The sky was still black as tar. “They ambushed us a bit after nine. I’d say it’s midnight now,” said Sirius.

Remus had many things in common with wristwatch wearers, but in spite of them all, he wasn’t the kind to wear one. He nodded and let the barn door creak shut. This told Sirius: _We’ll stay here. Anywhere else—at home, perhaps—would legitimise something I don’t want legitimised._

The bloodbell ring made Sirius feel like he was holding Remus’ hand when their arms dangled between them.

“There,” said Remus, pointing to a pile of straw.

Sirius wrinkled his nose. “You sure?”

Remus nodded. Sirius anticipated his first step before Remus could accidentally break his pinkie.

He took Remus by the elbow, then, stopping him. He looked in his eyes, but they were blackened by the shadows. “You’re sure?” he mumbled, and it looked like Remus smiled.

“Of course.” He touched Sirius’ hand on his arm, then turned to sit and lower himself to the straw.

Sirius swallowed as he kneeled. “Remus, I have to tell you something.” His pulse had never raced so fast, like he’d soon spring a leak in his bloodstream. It was a feeling he already wanted to forget.

Remus was brushing itchy straw from the back of his hair. “Right, go on.”

“Before we do this,” Sirius stammered. That was new, too. Stammering. “Er… fuck. I.” He sniffed. Dread dripped faster and faster into his stomach, like water melting off an ice cube the hotter it got. But this water felt like mud. He couldn’t take this any further without feeling like he was _scheming_ , or something of the sort. “I, er, I’m sorry. I, huh… I have feelings for you, so.” He blinked, bewildered when a hot tear dropped to the middle of his cheek. “I’d understand if that changes things. For you. Or makes you uncomfortable.” He coughed, as his voice had gone scratchy.

Remus took his free hand. He was as unreadable as ever and Sirius hated it. “I know.”

Sirius didn’t sob, but when he breathed, it certainly sounded like it. “You—how?”

“James told me.”

 _“James?”_ Sirius was indignant. He felt a second tear well in his eye, then drop. “But I never _told_ James.” He’d never told a soul. “Why would he tell you that?”

Remus shrugged, thumbing over Sirius’ knuckles. “Don’t punish him, Sirius,” he whispered. “I think he meant well.”

Of course he meant well. But—“Why? What did he expect?” Sirius breathed, jaw clenched. “What did he think would happen? _Nothing_ happened. Nothing good came of it. I’m just humiliated.”

Remus stroked his hair behind his ear. Sirius hated that it made his skin go up in sweet shivers. He wondered where his tears landed in the dark. Then he felt pathetic and wiped his eyes dry. “You can just tell me,” he murmured, shaky. “You can just tell me if you’re disturbed. We’re under a pureblood curse, and I’m in love with you, _you_ , who I now _need_ to… to… Merlin, lest we both give up the fucking ghost.” He laughed, shrill, let his head drop back, chin to the ceiling. “What the fuck.”

Remus dragged his thumb over Sirius’ earlobe. “It’s okay,” he said, eternally steadfast. “Shh. I’m not disturbed.”

“Mm. You say that.” Sirius took a breath, lifted his head. He sat back so his bum pressed to his heels, rubbing at the stinging tears around his eyes. “But—”

“I’m sure you’re disturbed, too.” Remus leaned into his elbows, swatted at a bit of hay that tickled his neck. “It’s hard not to be.”

 _This is shit_ , Sirius didn’t say. _And you don’t have to be so nice to me_. It was already bad enough for Remus, so for once, Sirius wouldn’t play Captain Obvious and remind him.

He plucked a piece of straw from the ground, concentrated on breaking it in half once, then again and again. Nerves seemed to cluster around his heart, to throb and bubble there. “Why did you say that?” He was stalling. Consciously. That’s why he’s being nice to you, Sirius thought, things would be over faster. And still, Sirius rambled. “About… Bella Nott. And Rita.” He smiled with twisted confusion at his creased frond of hay. “Remus, _what?”_

Remus shrugged. If he was blushing, Sirius couldn’t see, but he doubted it. “I thought you liked them.”

Sirius racked his memory. “I never—”

“Fifth year, you carried Isabella to the hospital wing yourself,” mumbled Remus, “mid-Quidditch match.”

“She fell thirty feet off her broom.” Sirius shrugged. He’d never meditated on it. “But I barely even knew her. Never thought about her.”

Remus didn’t acknowledge that. “Well, there was that summer we watched _Gilda_ on the projector in the Potters’ basement.”

Sirius smirked. “And I can’t enjoy a movie without wanting to shag the lead actress.”

Remus looked at him, unconvinced. “But it was _Rita_ —”

“Yes, yes, lovely lady, whatever.” Sirius waved his hand. His cheeks itched where the tears had dried. He didn’t understand Remus, and probably never would.

Remus hooked the tips of his cursed fingers over Sirius’. Sirius could feel his little finger sweating under the ring, but it wouldn’t slip out. Perhaps his whole hand was just clammy. Remus cleared his throat and said, strained, “Shall we?”

Sirius nodded but barely moved.

He could feel Remus’ eyes on him. Remus said, “Remember you can change your mind.”

 _Fat chance. Who do you think I am?_ Sirius almost chuckled. _Oh, never mind. I’ve wanted you since day one, but I’ve just_ now _stopped, when your life rests in my hands!_ “Yeah. You too,” said Sirius. He couldn’t meet Remus’ eyes. “Just…” Nebulously, he waved his hand again. “Just tell me. Give me a shove. Anything.”

Remus made a quiet hum.

Tentatively, Sirius reached for his jeans, one-handed. Remus did the same.

Sirius listened to their zippers. It was miserable. He coughed when he felt himself gag.

“Wait,” said Remus. Sirius wasn’t sure if he could be any more mortified. He kept his head bowed, halted his hand. Remus sighed, now somewhere closer to him, and curled his fingers into Sirius’ shoulder. “Come here.”

“Where,” croaked Sirius, but as Remus tugged, he lost his balance, forced his weight into the heels of his hands as he stumbled over Remus and scratched up his tender palm on the straw. The other pinned Remus’ hand down.

His arms were bracketing Remus’ waist.

Remus smiled faintly up at him from the bed of straw, something like that smile Sirius had told himself he’d memorise when they’d spoken of Herbology. “Forget about the curse,” mumbled Remus.

Sirius blinked, adjusted his weight as he felt himself sink into the straw. “That’s a rather tall order, Moony.” He would’ve never been between Remus’ legs if it weren’t for the curse.

“Just do it.” Remus brushed his calloused hands over the sides of Sirius’ neck. It sounded like there was a held breath behind his words. “It’ll be better for both of us if you do.”

Sirius swallowed and croaked, “Right,” as Remus thumbed underneath his jaw. The barn was already stuffy but Sirius felt his face fill with heat of its own.

Remus sighed—neither like a disappointed Remus sigh nor a resigned Remus sigh, so Sirius couldn’t place it. Then he smiled again. “Your heart’s beating so fast,” Remus murmured and dug his thumb into Sirius’ pulse.

“Fuck off my pulse, then,” muttered Sirius. Then Remus, whose legs were sprawled apart, drew them in closer to frame Sirius’ hips with his knees. Sirius glanced downward and watched it happen, so it had to be real.

“No.” Remus smirked, and he was at once a different person than he’d been since eighteen minutes to nine that night, Sirius swore it. He was the same Remus who sat across from Sirius at the Gryffindor table in the Great Hall and kicked bruises into Sirius’ shins when he said something dickish, the same Remus who gave him a covert smile across the Potions classroom when Sirius slingshotted a dung beetle into Snape’s cauldron. And Sirius knew then that Remus had been lying when he said _I haven’t changed_.

“Come down here,” Remus said, as casual as if he was asking Sirius to look at a gross bug he’d found on the ground. But when Sirius complied and bent at his elbows, Remus kissed him. It was nothing but a quick, firm press of lips, and then Remus’ head was back on the hay again. He still held Sirius’ neck, firm but gentle, like a vase he didn’t want to drop. “Again, it’ll be better if you’d just relax,” chided Remus, but gently.

Sirius might have been relaxing. Possibly. Involuntarily, maybe. His arms were going weak, like all the blood in them was rushing to his head and pins and needles were setting in. The hay rustled beneath them as Sirius breathed in raggedly and tipped his chin. His heart could’ve rattled right out of his chest as he squeezed his eyes shut and kissed Remus.

He expected to draw away the way Remus had. But Remus didn’t allow for it; he carded his fingers into Sirius’ hair, made a sort of muffled hum into Sirius’ mouth that zinged through Sirius’ body with searing heat.

“That’s it,” Remus appraised lowly. Sirius’ heart heaved with the sudden need to please him like _that_ , whatever he’d just done, but he hadn’t a fucking clue.

Remus hooked his arm round Sirius’ waist, coaxed him down to lay against him. Sirius had many a daydream like this over the years, but oftentimes they’d be foiled—and his boner confused—by the logistics of hypotheticals, exactly how _things_ happen, how limbs bloody move and where on earth to put them. Remus had always been smaller, weaker, even more than Sirius and his wealth of congenital health issues. But Remus’ growth spurt, the summer between sixth and seventh years, caught him up. And so Sirius didn’t have to worry so much about sinking down against him, only reveled in it.

“Remus,” he breathed, and through hazy, lidded eyes, saw the corners of Remus’ eyes wrinkle the way they did when he smiled hard enough.

“Mhm.” Remus pet his hair from his eyes, hooked his legs over Sirius’ calves to pin them down.

Sirius shifted onto his elbow. He must’ve felt _really_ uninhibited, he thought distantly, because he was dragging his hand underneath Remus’ jumper, feeling the warm scar tissue at his hip, squeezing his waist.

As he focused on it, as if seeing through his fingers, Remus kissed him on the neck. Sirius felt himself jolt and moan, gasping, and he turned to kiss Remus open-mouthed like he knew what he was doing.

He didn’t.

But Remus was accommodating. He might’ve laughed when Sirius licked into his mouth, but then he clutched at his cheek so tenderly he made it seem like he didn’t care, curled his fingers into Sirius’ hair so intentionally he made it feel like… not sparks, not lightning, that would be too clichéd. He made it feel like interest, like… desire. And it assuaged Sirius because by then, he’d already put the depths of his own want on display in a glass case.

Remus hummed as their tongues brushed, held Sirius’ face where he wanted it. Their zips were undone from the initial fumble, but still Sirius wasn’t ready for it when Remus drew the flat of his palm down Sirius’ chest and stomach and squeezed his cock through his briefs. Sirius’ eyes blew wide and his jaw worked through a tense gasp, and Remus smiled up at him and simpered, “For me?”

Sirius wondered if everyone received this kind of star treatment from Remus. He breathed heavily as he stroked just the tips of his fingers over the hair behind Remus’ ear, still scared to touch, still with eyes wide as saucers. He was… inexplicably turned on. “Fuck you, you know it is,” he breathed through a grin.

Remus’ smile tightened into something more intimate. With one rubbing Sirius’ crotch, he then stroked his cheek and mumbled, “Help me get out of my trousers, then.”

It was a clumsy manoeuvre with only two coordinated hands between them, but Sirius didn’t think he could manage anything with grace at that moment.

In undressing Remus, however, he felt more than he’d expected.

Sirius shrugged out of his jacket. When his sleeve only hung off his and Remus’ wrists, he didn’t hesitate to reach back for his wand and cast a quiet _Diffindo_ to slice the sleeve. He’d had quite enough of Remus tearing up his clothes and patching them back up again. He laid it beneath Remus’ bum before they could get his pants off.

“You do realise you’ve just irreversibly fucked up your jacket,” stated Remus, propped on his elbows with his gangly knees spread. Sirius kneeled between. “Mine would’ve been much better suited.”

“It’s okay.” Sirius’ lips quirked, but they didn’t stay that way for long. He grew far too concentrated as he gazed at Remus’ boxers, his pale stomach and the wiry hair below his navel. He’d only had glimpses of it when Remus changed in their dormitory.

“And you do know leather doesn’t just go in the wash, yeah? I’m not sure you want to think about my—”

“I’ll use magic, Christ. Shut up.” _You don’t know what I want to think about._ Sirius looked back down, then, fingers seemingly frozen in mid-air. Remus’ arm was a bridge between them, joined to Sirius’ little finger.

“I already gave you permission to take them off,” Remus said after a pause, brows lifted.

Sirius’ hands sagged down to his thighs and he sighed, shoulders slumped. “You’re sure?”

Remus merely looked at him. He took them off himself with his free hand. “Touching me’s gonna be necessary for this next bit, so…” Sirius’ toes curled in his boots. It was harder to breathe, seeing Remus hard. “You have permission for that, too,” Remus finished. When Sirius didn’t budge, he nudged his toe into the middle of Sirius’ chest.

“Right.” Summarily, he shifted nearer to Remus again, swallowed when his cock gave a twitch just at their proximity, and found his balance over his body again. When he lifted his head, Remus’ eyes seemed to smile at him when his mouth didn’t. He cupped Sirius’ chin betwixt his fingers, pecked his lips.

Sirius hummed into it. Then he promptly panicked. He breathed, “Do you know the spell—”

Remus nodded. He first lifted Sirius’ hand into a ready position—Sirius had to shift his weight, pin all of it onto their ringed, interlaced fingers—then took up his wand from the straw. “This is for you to prep me,” he stated, like he was explaining _Wingardium Leviosa_ or naming the Fat Lady’s long-dead painter, and pressed the tip of his wand to the middle of Sirius’ palm. Sirius felt a pulse of magic, and his palm was wet. “I’ve… already done the spellwork on myself. To make sure I’m clean, that is.”

Sirius had to ponder on what _clean_ meant. He felt like he was still years behind everyone else, who seemed to know things he didn’t about sex that were never taught at Hogwarts. They just _knew_.

But Remus was sleeping with muggles, and was vulnerable to their diseases. That he knew.

“Do you—need it?” Remus asked him. “Need me to do it?”

Sirius didn’t even have to think. “No.” He reddened.

Remus put his wand down. “Okay.”

In hindsight, it would have been easier for Sirius to simply _tell_ Remus he’d never done this before. Any of this. But he’d already bumbled, was still bumbling, and it would be like a boulder rolling down a mountain he couldn’t stop.

But… Remus was good at guiding him. He did it whilst keeping his fingers rooted on Sirius’ neck. Sirius felt the greatest rush of heat when, with two of his fingers inside of Remus, he rendered him speechless. Remus had to drop his head onto the straw, rub his hand down his face and swallow down a noise Sirius couldn’t tell him he was desperate to hear.

“Good?” whispered Sirius.

Remus cracked a wry smile with his hand still blindfolding his eyes. “Yes. Yeah.”

* * *

_This isn’t going to last very long._

Sirius panted into Remus’ neck.

Their cursed fingers were slotted and laced, and Remus hugged him round the waist. Sirius had a flimsy grasp on the straw somewhere above Remus’ head.

Remus’ sage advice had stopped. It’d been several minutes since either of them had spoken a coherent word. Sirius had tried, but his thoughts seemed to melt the second they reached the tip of his tongue.

The hay rustled beneath them, rhythmic when Sirius could manage, arrhythmic when he couldn’t. Remus’ lips brushed his ear, and his fingers found their way up his spine to stroke his hair. It’d grown long. Sirius hadn’t had a trim in ages.

Remus grunted. Sirius’ eyes, half-lidded, threatened to roll back into his head.

“Remus,” he keened, heady but edgy, and Remus immediately cupped the back of his head and murmured into his ear, “Good, love, that’s good, do it.”

“Oh,” Sirius breathed. He felt tense, uncontrollable, and simultaneously nothing but a stirring rush where him and Remus were one.

And then the ring, as if growing two sizes larger, slipped on their sweating fingers when Remus flexed his hand. Sirius heard Remus swallow as he freed Sirius’ fingers and let the ring go. It skidded down the hay and clunked dully against the concrete, sounding extraordinarily ordinary.

To Sirius, it felt foreign to have full mobility of his own hand. There was still a sort of tingling between his ears.

Remus rubbed his hand over the t-shirt at Sirius’ shoulder. “Sirius, would you—”

“Yeah, sorry.” He shifted, felt Remus’ hard-on rub against his lower belly.

His jacket wasn’t a mess with much of anything but lube and sweat. As soon as Sirius was on his knees, Remus was rising up, seeking out his boxers to hop into.

Sirius, on his knees, asked a question he knew the answer to. “Did you not want me—”

“It’s fine.” Sirius heard Remus’ zipper. “We need to get out of here.”

Sirius didn’t feel fully in control of his limbs just yet. He managed to cover up again with some effort. “What do we do about the ring?” he murmured, boots thumping as he stood.

As if they weren’t surrounded by straw, Remus snapped his wand at the ring and set it afire. It extinguished itself, unchanged. Momentarily, he decided, “We leave it.” Remus picked his way through the straw toward the barn doors, and with his wand he snuffed out the lantern and restored the glow of _Lumos_ to its tip. Sirius only rotated his wand between his fingers, eyes on the matted spot in the hay. He held his jacket by its collar.

“Are you coming?” demanded Remus.

Sirius swiveled on his heel, slipped outside through the gap in the doors that Remus held open. The night was thick and silent, and Remus spoke first. “We’ll tell Dumbledore we got taken out, woke up in the barn unharmed with everything and everyone gone.”

Sirius kicked the door shut and bit the inside of his lip.

“Understand?” Remus urged, which made Sirius scoff.

“Yes, sir,” he said and smiled derisively past Remus’ shoulder. As if Dumbledore wouldn’t find that the least bit suspicious. The wind breezed through his hair. “I might be grasping in the dark here, Remus, but I’ll wager you’re not coming home tonight.” There was no use in calling it _home_. Sirius resented that he’d sunk to using the word.

Remus sighed and put his hands in his pockets. “No,” he said, like he had to think about it, but Sirius knew otherwise.

“Right. Brilliant.” He scratched his jaw, then turned to march off onto the moor where Apparition might echo less. He gave Remus plenty of time to call him back, but that sort of thinking just made himself the punchline of the joke. The marshy grass swallowed up his heavy boots as he walked. Surrounded by the moor, Sirius raised his wand to Disapparate, leaving behind only Remus and a trail of sodden footprints.

* * *

Remus didn’t wander the streets looking for sex every night, contrary to what he would have Sirius believe. If he wound up at a muggle bar and was chatted up, he wouldn’t necessarily refuse. But it was mostly a matter of staying far from home.

On nights he was free from sticking his neck out for the Order, he’d traipse through the city center… wherever he happened to be. London most often, near his and Sirius’ flat, once his trips took him back home, full circle. He’d stop at the window of the first real estate agency he came across, scan the listings until he found a neighbourhood he’d yet to visit. It was risky, Apparating into unfamiliar residential areas, but on weeknights past dusk, most people were in their homes, or simply too weary to call any attention to Remus stepping out of an empty alley with no inlets. And on weekends, they were drunk.

He had once Apparated into a bush in the back garden of a listing, and had never wished more that he had full control of his inner animal the way Sirius and James and Peter did, because to a child stacking legos just beyond the home’s glass doors, a reedy man in the bushes out back wasn’t the most welcome sight.

That was the worst of his gambles.

On a different occasion, after five straight nights of town-hopping, from London to Oxford-abouts to Coventry to Wolverhampton and over the England-Wales border, he’d chanced himself in his mum’s childhood village of Llangynidr. Needless to say he hadn’t stuck around long.

It was a week after his encounter with Sirius in the barn, four days since the last Order meeting—which Sirius had spent in uncharacteristic silence—and twenty-four hours since the full moon.

“After the dullness of your last assignment, you’ll be charmed to know I need you on solo reconnaissance,” Dumbledore had told him days earlier in James and Lily’s kitchen.

“Not Greyback’s pack,” muttered Remus, fingers sinking into his hips as he cast a backward glance at the kitchen door. Beyond the subtle sheen of a silencing charm hanging in the doorway, Sirius sat in an overstuffed armchair. James perched on its arm, chattering with Benjy Fenwick. Somehow, Sirius sensed him looking, so Remus turned.

“No, not Greyback’s.” Dumbledore smiled and pushed an envelope across the table.

The mission had been the night prior.

Still in clothes dusted with earth and a prickling open gash on his cheek that he’d need a mirror to fix with magic, he shuffled down a Nottingham footpath, past a closed Chinese restaurant and unoccupied ground floor spaces with windows screaming _FOR RENT_. He had grown used to the pain, but it stung whenever he dabbed his cheek with the blood-spotted sleeve of his coat, which had seen better days.

Remus didn’t call much attention to the passing woman, hand-in-hand with a small child, until he heard the child speak.

“Mummy, that man’s hurt,” the child whisper-yelled across the chasm of their height difference.

And so the mother stopped in her tracks. Remus acted like he hadn’t heard, dragged his feet along and angled his head toward a passing car. Then he felt a gentle tap on his shoulder. He should have run, cast something wandless to distract them. But he was tired. Swearing internally, he found within himself the kindest smile he could manage and turned toward the woman, who was lowering her hand. She couldn’t have been over thirty, and while Remus was certain he’d never met her, there was something about her face that compelled him to feel he had. High cheekbones, a choppy, brunette bob. No, he’d never met her.

“Can I help you?” said Remus.

Her smile was cautious, but her gaze strangely bold. “I rather think it’s me who might help you.” The child on her arm stared up at Remus—or at his cut, wide-eyed.

Remus leaned backward onto his heels. “I’m sorry?”

“Please.” The woman adjusted her grip on the child’s hand. “We’re not far from here.” She gestured down the street. “Just around the corner, actually. We could clean you up in a jiffy.”

Remus blushed at her candidness. “I really don’t think that’s necessary.” He glanced in both directions down the footpath. “In fact, I’d urge you to be more careful about who you invite in your home—”

The woman took hold of Remus’ elbow. The child seemed to smirk, but was once again enraptured by the gash on Remus’ cheek. “Nonsense. I insist,” the woman said. Her handbag slipped to her elbow as she hustled Remus along. The child kept better pace with the woman than he did. “I think of myself as a stellar judge of character. And we’re just around the corner, like I said.”

So Remus reluctantly fell into step with the woman. He made no effort to conceal his rattled stare at her profile, and she continued to walk briskly. The child’s enthusiastic steps echoed on the pavement.

“Thank you,” said Remus, as the trio stood at the door of a red brick house.

“Don’t thank me yet,” the woman murmured. “You might need stitches, and it’s been a while since I last did those by hand.”

Remus lifted his brows. They ascended several flights of stairs to the topmost floor, where the woman unlocked the door to a cosy flat.

The child sat on a stool by the door to take off their shoes, and all the while, continued to eye Remus with curiosity.

“My husband’s on a work trip,” the woman explained. “I’ll get you a change of clothes from his closet.” Addressing the child, she said, “Darling, put the kettle on, and clear a spot at the table so he can sit.” Then she bustled away to an adjacent room.

Remus removed his shoes, feeling too slow for his host. The child smiled at him.

He asked, “What’s your name?”

The child frowned, and took a moment to think as they slipped off the stool and padded toward the kitchen. “Hennessy,” they said, and pressed the button on an electric kettle.

Remus blinked, following. “Like the brandy?”

The child grinned and laughed, shoving aside crayons and piles of illustrated construction paper at the table. They kneeled to pick up a green one that’d fallen to the floor. “Yep.” The child nodded. “I saw it on a bottle at my gran’s house last week, thought it was nice. And people can call me Nessy, like the monster in Loch Ness.”

The woman returned and pressed a bundle of clothing into Remus’ hands. “Nessy has a different name every week,” she supplied, hands in fists on her waist. “She was _Jem_ last Tuesday. Let me take your jacket.”

“I wouldn’t if the name you gave me weren’t so horrid,” Nessy said glumly.

The woman chuckled. “All my fault.” She laid a first-aid kit on the table and draped Remus’ dirty jacket over her arm. He felt like he was in the gentlest of tornadoes. “The toilet’s through that door, go have a quick wash and change out of… those.” She warily eyed Remus’ raggedy jumper, patted the cap on a bottle of rubbing alcohol. “And then we’ll get you cleaned up.”

Remus did as he was told. There was a blue and green toothbrush clinging horizontally to the side of the sink by a suction cup. Something told Remus it was Nessy’s.

He realised, as he peered into the mirror, that he looked like the living dead, dark circles and open wound and all. He took pity on the woman for pitying him so, but at least he understood why.

The water running off his soaped palms swirled with a dusty tan colour that showed on the white ceramic of the sink. The husband’s clothes, a simple, white t-shirt and a pair of pyjama bottoms, were a bit short on Remus, but he couldn’t complain. He tied the drawstrings of the bottoms tightly and hid his wand there. He worried, though, as he stepped out of the toilet with his clothes in hand, which the woman promptly took from him to wash, that he was being cornered into staying the night, slipping into the clean, warm comfort of the woman’s generosity.

Remus had a mug of tea between his palms, and the woman was dabbing at his face with cotton pads that burned. He told Nessy through a wince, “I have a friend we call Jem sometimes.”

Nessy had put on pyjamas, too, whilst Remus had washed up. She sat beside Remus at the table with her chin in her hands. “What’s he like?”

“He’s brilliant.” Remus shrugged, took a shaky sip of tea as the woman numbed his cheek with ice. “He was head boy when we were at school. Excellent…” He rethought his words. “…At sports.”

“Wicked,” said Nessy. “Maybe I’ll go back to Jem on Friday.” She picked at the paper covering on a red crayon. “What’s your name?”

“Remus.”

“Weird.” Nessy glanced at her mother. “I mean… sorry. But it’s weird.”

Remus smiled. “Believe me, I know.”

She smiled, too, satisfied. “All of Mummy’s family has weird names, too.” Then she squinted at him. Remus saw the flash of a needle and forceps in the woman’s hands, but felt only a pinch. “Are you old?” asked Nessy. “I can’t tell. You’re tall, but… are you old like Mummy?”

The woman gave a snort. “Believe me, darling, he’s not as old as Mummy.” Her strong fingers held Remus’ face steady.

“Oh.” She watched Remus curiously. Under the kitchen lights, her brown hair looked greenish, which Remus hadn’t noticed before.

“Go brush your teeth, Ness,” the woman said calmly. “Mummy’s having a sleepover in your room tonight.”

Nessy brightened immeasurably. “Really?! Yes!” she hissed, and sprinted to the toilet, slammed the door shut with vigour.

Remus grew hesitant at the news of the sleepover. “You really don’t have—”

“We always have sleepovers when my husband is away, my daughter and I,” stated the woman. She gave him a sly smile. “So the open bed would be there anyway.” She focused on Remus’ cheek. “Just a nap might do you some good.”

Remus simply breathed a moment. “You’re very kind.”

The woman considered his words. “Repay my kindness to someone else.” She sat back, examining the results of her toil. “That’s what makes the world go ‘round.” She pursed her lips, lightly pressed her thumb to the suture. “It’ll leave a bit of a scar, I think.”

Remus rubbed at his eye and gave her a tired smile. “I’ll add it to my collection.”

* * *

For an hour, Remus laid atop the sheets in the woman’s bedroom. Across the hall, Nessy and her mother had been giggling since they’d shut the door. It wasn’t keeping Remus awake, necessarily, but to some extent, it unsettled him to not be the only one awake, the last one awake. When he did fall asleep beside a stranger, it was only once he made sure they’d drifted off first. And even then, sleep might still evade him.

He turned on the nightstand lamp. There was a reddish-brown roll-top writing desk in the corner of the bedroom. He tucked his wand under the pillow and went to take a seat at the desk, drummed his fingers carefully against its edge before he rolled it open.

To his surprise, this revealed a neat stack of parchment—not in long scrolls like they’re expected to buy for Hogwarts, but cut into rectangles like most muggle paper—and a pot of ink and a quill in a cup. Something in Remus snapped and he scooted the chair forward, uncovered the pot of ink, and laid flat a piece of parchment.

_Sirius,_

It was a familiar and banal start. It wasn’t often that Remus’ nightly hosts had such elaborate writing desk arrangements, but most had pens and paper of some sort. He’d wasted many a page, distributed the crumpled balls in wastebaskets across England.

The quill dripped a splotch onto the parchment.

_It seems that everything I’d worried about has now transpired._

_I know you’ve been confused. You must be even more so now—I couldn’t have been more obvious—unless you’re so down on yourself that you’ve managed to entrench yourself in oblivion._

_I’m sorry I told you what James said. He only said it because he was furious with me. He didn’t understand why I was acting the way I am, as he’d always been under the impression that I returned any feelings you had for me—or that I entertained them, at the basest. He was under that impression, at least, until a few months ago, when I started this charade._

_The pathetic thing is, I thought I’d been doing a good job—acting the part of wanting nothing to do with you. But I’ve only been a fool, you see, because I can’t go seven years without, and expect the transition to be seamless._

_You said I seemed to not want things to ‘go back to normal.’ And normal would be just that—not pretending. But you’re right. I don’t._

_The last thing I ever want is to lose you forever. And I thought, if I didn’t have you, or if I had of you the very smallest bit that I could manage after knowing and loving and clinging to you for seven years, it would feel like losing less._

_I’ve never been more naive._

_Even if that hadn’t happened between us, I would have thought about it, and continued to think about it. And it wasn’t the same as in my dreams, but the mad thing is, I thought about it just as much after as before that happened. And I still think about it that very same amount._

_I didn’t think that was possible. I always thought I’d be consumed whole should we ever get so close._

_But I realise now that I’ve been consumed all along._

_We were at death’s door. It was a close call. It wasn’t the first, and it won’t be the last. But I still don’t want to lose you forever._

_Though I am consumed by you and have been, for a long, long time, Sirius, I’ll keep at this futile campaign to possibly love you less should the day come when I do lose you._

_That is the most selfish thing I’ve ever said or written._

_I’m sorry you had to see me the way you did. I’m sorry I’m so cruel to you._

~~_I can’t stop thinking about the touch of your hand_ ~~

_I think in another life, we could’ve been_

Remus put down the quill with a shaking hand. He felt the stained grain of the desk’s wood with his fingertips, then clutched at his chin, at his mouth, feeling the points of his incisors through his lip.

Wishing to go about it with the least noise, he took a breath, folded the parchment in half once, and again, and again. He dropped it into the empty wastebasket, and had a mind to set it aflame, but didn’t want to trigger any smoke detectors… nor the attention of Nessy and her mother. _Evanesco_ would’ve done, but he wasn’t thinking straight.

Wand in hand, he padded from the bedroom to the kitchen, where the woman had draped Remus’ clean, damp clothes over a rack. He spelled them dry, stripped and redressed, and folded her husband’s clothes into a neat pile on a kitchen chair. He would’ve left them any money he had, but he never went on a pack mission with belongings of import.

Standing in the middle of the flat, the light was finally out in Nessy’s bedroom, giggles subdued. As he stepped toward the coat rack, Nessy’s bedroom door creaked open and she slipped out. Remus froze.

As not to wake her mother, she whispered, “Are you leaving?”

Remus, still flustered from his hysteric letter, could only nod at first. His wand was in his hand, and he wasn’t sure his subtle attempt to hide it behind his leg fooled the shrewd little girl. She didn’t comment. “I’m very grateful to you and your mother,” he said softly.

Nessy nodded, rocking back and forth on her feet. “Well, I hope you don’t get beat up again.”

Remus chuckled, lifting his brows. “Me too.”

Nessy lifted her hand to wave at him. In the dark, under the moon’s glow through the window, her hair had a blueish sheen to it. “Bye, Remus.”

“Goodbye, Nessy.”

“It’s Jem now.” She smiled at him proudly.

Remus’ chest might have caved in for its hollowness. “Forgive me. Goodbye, Jem.”

* * *

“It seems important.”

The woman clutched the folded bit of parchment between her fingers. There was a stern line between her dark brows. “We don’t read other people’s letters, Nymphadora.”

“I didn’t read the whole thing!” Jem screeched, going pink in the face, and in the hair. “I didn’t even understand all the words! And don’t _call me_ that!” Tears sprang to her dark eyes. 

The woman sighed, lowering herself to a chair and laying her palm to her lap, the letter pinned to her knee.

Jem hated the silence, and she hated her mother’s disappointment. “I didn’t know what it was! I saw it in the wastebasket but there’s _never_ anything in there ‘cos Daddy _never_ writes there!” She felt heat well up behind her eyes, between her temples.

“Love, I’m sure Remus threw it away for a reason.”

Jem glared at her mother. Then she snatched the letter from her grip, sped into her room, and slammed and locked the door.

“Nympha _dora!”_ her mother roared, but that only made her angrier and faster. She was already scrambling to her desk, uncapping a marker so she could scrawl _Sirius Black_ on the letter’s blank side in bright purple. She unlatched the door to her screech owl’s cage, threw the window open to the sunny morning, and urged the letter into her owl’s beak. Her owl had great, big staring eyes and big, fluffy ear tufts, and appeared just as alarmed now as he always did when she demanded his services. Once he’d snatched the letter from her and held it securely in his beak, she swiveled the cage to face the window.

“Get it safely to Sirius Black,” Jem panted, and was ready to scream when her mother spelled the door open, but the owl took flight, soaring into the sunlight and over Nottingham rooftops.


End file.
